Kuudere Zaizen!
by micchimelon
Summary: "Oi, Zaizen. Has anyone ever told you how much of a kuudere you are?" ZaizenXOC


**Title:** Kuudere Zaizen!

**Rated T for mild coarse language in future chapters!**

* * *

"Can I have the rest of your tamagoyaki, Hatsumi-chan?"

She raised an eyebrow at her best friend, a plump boy with fair skin and spiky hair, and then slightly smiled before saying, "Sure thing." Her best friend had always loved her cooking, and Hatsumi knew that by now she should have gotten used to lunch breaks like these when he would plead for food from her bento.

As she glanced around the classroom, with the girls and boys all busy eating their lunch, or chatting away with their friends, or fooling around with other students from the next class, Hatsumi can't help but be jealous of them. Their lives looked interesting—compared to hers, at the least.

Her life had all the intrigue a young school girl's life could make claims to, which is only a little more stimulating than the bare minimum required to keep the human mind from becoming obsolete.

She had already come to terms with how exceedingly uneventful life can be, and she had actually grown to appreciate her banal existence. Monotony grows on you. But still, the thought of possible future adventures—or anything else to escape the boredom called Hirasaki Hatsumi's Life, was more than welcome.

Several moments later, Hatsumi stood up, her chair unceremoniously scraping the floor with a loud screech, but still quite inadequate to direct their classmates' attention to her. It just dissolved into the classroom noise, as well as her soft utterance of "I'm going to the toilet. You can have the rest of my food." After which, her overweight male best friend happily complied and proceeded to transfer the food from her bento to his own.

With a sigh, Hatsumi slid the door close behind her and started walking past the rest of the second year classrooms in order to reach the toilet at the end of the corridor. With the noise receding with every step she took closer to her destination, a new kind of sound started registering into her range of hearing.

"Z-Z-Zaizen-kun," she heard a timid, high-pitched voice say. _Zaizen? That Zaizen Hikaru from my class?_ wondered Hatsumi, listening as the girl continued, "I think I'm in love with you."

It made her stop in her tracks. _A confession_, Hatsumi realized with a gasp of slight excitement climbing up her throat.

Quickly hiding behind the wall, she listened more intently, despite the guilt crawling around her body due to being aware that she was invading someone else's privacy.

She had heard lots of things about that guy, both good and bad; but now that Hatsumi thought about it, she had never really talked to him before. They call him Shitenhouji's Tensai, and Hatsumi knew that with his handsome face most girls would love to flock to him like crazy if not for the glares he sends their way when he sees them coming towards him. _Talk about scary, cold guys._

Speaking of coldness, Hatsumi had heard bad things about him too. Things like 'Zaizen Hikaru is a rude prick' and 'He's a jerk' and 'He may be good-looking and smart and athletic, but he is a heartless guy', and when Hatsumi first heard these things about him, she wondered whether or not they were true or if people were just being judgmental. She hoped it was the latter.

"Sorry." Zaizen said.

The girl might've been waiting for him to say more—why he's rejecting her, or if he likes someone else, or if he hates her, or... something other than a mere sorry. Anything. Instead, he started walking away, his footsteps nearing Hatsumi who started panicking in response.

She was still deciding if she should run away or just calmly walk by as if she heard nothing because that Zaizen Hikaru dude might diss her for eavesdropping or something like that. She had seen him do so a few times in class.

She heard his footsteps stop and Hatsumi, eyes glued to the floor, suddenly noticed a shadow in front of her. She looked up, only to be intimidated by a pair of intense dark eyes that were staring at her, boring into her. She was about to apologize when Zaizen started speaking.

"You were eavesdropping, weren't you?" He asked her, his eyes still on hers, as if scrutinizing her like she was an insect or some other lowly creature.

Hatsumi felt embarrassed, the heat creeping up to her cheeks and making her even more uncomfortable—as if she wasn't already uneasy with Zaizen looking all high and mighty like that.

"I'm sor-"

"Well, it's not like I care anyway." He broke their eye contact and started walking away, leaving a rejected, crying girl and a flustered, ashamed Hatsumi in his wake.

* * *

The second time that Zaizen Hikaru spoke to Hirasaki Hatsumi was a moment way too similar to the first.

She was using the faucet nearest to their school's race track to wash away the mud that splattered on her right leg ("Thanks to that know-it-all boy who hit me with a soccer ball," Hatsumi muttered to herself.) when she heard yet again another confession being made.

The faucet she was using was near the famous cherry blossom tree in Shitenhouji, the one that was popular among the students for being a good confession spot. Hatsumi thought it was ridiculous. _When confessing to someone, is the place really that important?_ she had asked herself once, but later laughed it off and declared to herself that she will never do something as incredulous as that.

"Zaizen-kun," a girl said, "I... like you."

Hatsumi knew better than to eavesdrop. That Zaizen guy would definitely diss her again, and she didn't want him to look at her with that annoying oh-you-look-so-pathetic-face again. Never again, Hatsumi swore to herself. Every time she remembered that encounter, she had the urge to punch him in the face.

But then again, she was here before the confession even started, so she supposed that he had no right to diss her again if ever he catches her. So with renewed confidence and self-assurance, Hatsumi continued rubbing off the mud stains on her track pants, using the running water flowing from the faucet.

"Sorry." Zaizen said, and without even seeing his face, Hatsumi could already picture his emotionless face. _How heartless_.

Somehow, Hatsumi's rubs had become harsher as she recalled that Zaizen guy's face, those intense dark eyes, and his cold attitude—everything about him. Her fingers had become red after scrubbing and rubbing the stain, as if Zaizen Hikaru was that mud stain on her pants and she wanted it to disappear then and there.

Hatsumi didn't even know why she was so irritated at him after only talking to him once.

Maybe it was because he acted as if he was superior to her. Maybe because he looked at her with such an annoying air-of-superiority-expression and her girl pride was something she highly valued. Or perhaps because her feminist side kicked in that time and she felt pity towards that girl he rejected before. She didn't know for sure.

"W-why?" the girl demanded, voice cracking as if a sob was threatening to come out of her.

After a few moments of silence (well, not really—the girl had started sobbing after all), Zaizen drawled out, "You're not my type."

_Tch_. Hatsumi wanted to go out of her way to punch him in the face. _Poor girl._

Hatsumi knew that rejection was rejection, no matter how hard anyone tries to sugarcoat it. But still. He could've rejected her in a less mean way.

The girl had become a sobbing mess by now, and Zaizen started walking away despite that. Hatsumi, who was still rubbing and scrubbing the mud stain off her pants, didn't notice that very same guy whom her annoyance was all about, approach her.

Zaizen stopped in front of the girl kneeling in front of the faucet.

"You were listening, weren't you?" He asked. Hatsumi looked up and suddenly, memories of their previous encounter flashed on her mind. Anger started swelling inside her, but not really reaching the surface.

This time though, Hatsumi knew what to do.

She scoffed and said, "I was here before that girl even started confessing to you. Look," Hatsumi gestured towards the mud stains on her pants and continued, "I've been washing here before you two even got there."

"So you admit you were listening."

_Ugh._

"Well, duh!" She retorted with a roll of her eyes. "You two were just basically near me! Were you expecting me to cover my ears?"

Hatsumi expected him to reply with something witty, but instead, Zaizen's face remained expressionless, his intense dark eyes boring into her once again.

After a few moments of silence and intense staring contest (more like, _glaring_ contest, at least on Hatsumi's part), Zaizen broke the eye contact.

"Hmm."

He smirked and turned around to walk away, leaving a curiously bewildered Hatsumi behind.

* * *

That was the last time they talked to each other. Well, at least in their middle school lives.

There was no longer a moment when Hatsumi accidentally encountered one of the girls in their school confessing to him, and there was no longer a time when Zaizen ever remembered her. Eventually, those two times they ever talked to each other were soon forgotten.

Time moved on, with Zaizen focusing on his studies, tennis, and his love for music; Hatsumi on the other hand, focused on her duties as a member of the Theater Arts Club, and as the eldest daughter among three children. She had a bit of difficulty with some of her subjects but with a dash of hard work, she soon graduated from middle school. Zaizen too graduated at the same time, and they both had forgotten each other as they started high school.

Or maybe, they hadn't completely forgotten about each other.

* * *

"That concludes the first year orientation," the principal of the school, an old man with a cheerful disposition said with a bright tone. "Please proceed to your assigned classrooms to have your first ever homeroom session."

The freshmen students stood up from their seats and started filing out of the school auditorium, chatting casually with other students and newfound friends. First days were never good to her, Hatsumi realized as she walked out with the rest of the crowd. She was late for the freshmen orientation, so she had no choice but to take the unoccupied seat beside an unknown teacher.

Because of this, she still hasn't made even just one friend. And the fact that her best friend—that cute, chubby boy who always snatched food from her bento, was still somewhere in Tokyo was unbearable. He transferred out of Shitenhouji during their last year in middle school, and since then, their communication had only been limited to SMS and internet chatting.

Hatsumi wished that his family would somehow move back to Osaka and that he'd go to the same high school as hers, but that seemed like a far-fetched wish now.

_**1-C**_

The sign above the sliding doors said.

It was her class.

With a sigh, she mustered all her courage and prepared to give a smile to anyone who wanted to make friends with her. She could already hear some chattering inside the room, so she slowly slid the door open and entered, closing it immediately behind her.

She looked around and saw several familiar faces—previous schoolmates from Shitenhouji Middle School. Hatsumi was delighted.

"Hirasaki-san!" some girls approached her and started introducing themselves, asking, "Do you remember us?"

Hatsumi nodded and said, "Yeah! Shitenhouji people, aren't ya?"

They all smiled and started talking about previous schoolmates whom they heard were going to the same high school as theirs. Some of the people they talked about, Hatsumi knew. But most of them, she didn't. She was never one to care about everything and everyone back then in Shitenhouji.

"Ne, ne, I saw Zaizen-kun in the auditorium a while ago!" One of the girls said with a giggle, and the remaining two squealed in joy after hearing this. "What class do you think he's in?"

"I hope he's in our class!" one of them said with a dreamy look in her eyes, hands cupping her cheeks as they reddened at the thought of their precious Zaizen Hikaru being in the same class as them.

_Zaizen Hikaru, huh?_ Hatsumi couldn't help but smile at the memories that flashed back. She had been annoyed and irritated at him before, but looking back now, she can't help but be a bit ashamed of how silly she had been for being angry at a guy who coldly rejected a girl she didn't even know. It was funny remembering that time, as well as that time when she was furiously removing a stain on her jersey and pretending it was him.

Well, that was when she was just an immature fourteen-year-old. But now, she was almost sixteen and more mature, she thinks.

"Hirasaki-san, you're smiling," one of the girls said and teased her with a sly smile, "Do you like Zaizen-kun?"

_Hell no__._

"No I don't," Hatsumi said with a smooth disagreement and smiled at them, "I just think that our uniform now is cuter than the one we wore in Shitenhouji."

The girls agreed with her and started talking about some clothes shop and fashion statements that she was sure she never heard about. She could only nod and say 'yeah' to everything they talked about, fairly aware that she doesn't belong with this kind of crowd.

The classroom started becoming more occupied and seats were being filled up one by one as more students came to the classroom.

Suddenly, the rest of the girls stopped chattering away in their high-pitched voices as the door was slid closed by an attention-grabbing male student who just entered—a fair-skinned boy with fine black hair and ear piercings.

Even Hatsumi shut up as he walked past her and made his way towards the seat at the farthest row beside the window. After he had settled down, he took out his headphones from his bag and started listening to some music, oblivious to the fact that he had just won almost all the hearts of the girls in the classroom.

_Zaizen Hikaru_, Hatsumi thought to herself. _I hope he's not the same, cold guy from two years ago._

* * *

"Those were some good introductions you got there, kids!"

Their homeroom teacher turned out to be a young man on his mid-twenties, with a dimple on his left cheek and a smooth, flawless skin. Simply put, he was a tall man with a comely face and a good nature, Hatsumi observed.

What she didn't like was the fact that he made them introduce themselves one by one in front of the whole class. Hatsumi didn't like introductions. _Who on earth does anyway?_

Almost all the girls tensed and sighed dreamily when Zaizen took his turn, she noticed. Well, it can't be helped, can it? Zaizen was a good-looking guy when they were in their middle school years. And now that they were in high school, puberty and teenage years have done him well, so he was now rather very handsome. And well-built too, as expected of a good tennis player.

He said little about himself, so Hatsumi wondered whether or not his attitude changed at all. Maybe it was still early to judge him.

"I know that most of you don't know each other well," Harada-sensei said, smiling in a charming way. "So, I'm gonna partner you all with someone randomly and the two of you have to do a project together. It's called 'I Love My Partner Scrapbook'."

The students looked at him incredulously, surprised that they would have a project right on the first day of school. And a project with a ridiculous title to boot! _I Love My Partner Scrapbook? What the hell is up with that?_ Hatsumi's eyebrows furrowed before remembering what her mother told her about forgetting that habit to avoid wrinkles from such an early age.

Harada-sensei chuckled at the reactions from the students before continuing, "Don't worry though, it's still due on the last day of school."

A collective sigh escaped the mouths of everyone else.

"The scrapbook will basically be a picture-diary of events that you and your partner have attended together throughout the entire school year," he felt encouraged to talk as soon as he saw some students being relieved that it was just such a simple scrapbook-making project. "For example, the first task on the check list is to go to the zoo together; you and your partner have to have a picture as evidence that you two actually went together, so you have to have a picture taken of you two with the Zoo sign, or something like that.

"That's why it's called a scrapbook, kids. Make it look like one!"

A student sitting on the front row raised his hand hesitantly and asked in a voice barely loud enough to reach the ones seated in the farthest row, "So sensei will be the one to tell us which tasks to do together?"

Harada-sensei nodded energetically and smiled before replying, "Yes, I am going to give each pair a checklist of tasks, and you are required to do at least 75% of them," he beamed at his students before saying, "If not, then it's detention for ya!"

A skeptical-looking student, a boy with glasses sitting beside Hatsumi raised his hand and asked, "Sensei, what's the point of this project?"

"To get to know your partner well!"

"Sensei," a pretty girl called out and asked, "Can't we just pick our partner?"

"Nope! Oh yeah, now that you mention it," Harada-sensei opened his file case and fished out a sheet of paper, presumably the class list before declaring, "I'm gonna start randomly calling names now! Listen carefully on who your partner is."

* * *

He thought this whole project crap was ridiculous.

Zaizen had never really liked projects that needed a partner or group mates to get it done. There was always a possibility of being paired up with a lazy-ass student, and Zaizen didn't like being the dependable one amongst pair works and group works.

There was also the danger of being paired up with a girl, and Zaizen didn't like the thought of dealing with a female whose cheeks were always furiously blushing when he talks to them.

It's not that he was sexist. He just wasn't good around them.

From what he's observed so far, most girls get too emotionally attached sometimes, and he never takes much pleasure in talking about feelings and other lovey-dovey stuff. Sure, he's had a girlfriend or two before, but that was just a part of his phase wherein he wanted to find out the feeling of having one, to know what it's like.

Unfortunately, he didn't feel the thrill in it.

When he was a little boy, the idea of being sixteen was unimaginable. It sounded horrible. High school sounded horrible. Girls sounded like the worst thing in the universe, right up there with their grandma's lacy bras and the misses around the toilet.

Soon enough, he grew up and girls, who looked like Roswell victims to him before, suddenly became something of interest. But still, they weren't as interesting as music, tennis, and the internet world. Zaizen knew his priorities very well.

"Zaizen and Hirasaki," Harada-sensei called out. "Please raise your hands." They were the last pair to be mentioned.

Zaizen lazily complied, sparing a brief glance at the other person who raised her hand and turned her head to look at him with an expression of—wait, was she glaring at him?

_Looks familiar._

* * *

**First chapter: done!**

**Zaizen is such an interesting character and he reminds me of one of my best buddies during high school. Ha-ha. =D**

**Please review~**


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